


exactly who we are (is just enough)

by blackorchids



Category: Matilda (1996)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Future Fic, Gen, Growing Up, Happy, Minor Original Character(s), Time Skips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2019-12-22
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:22:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21896605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackorchids/pseuds/blackorchids
Summary: Matilda is older now, but the best things stay the same.
Relationships: Jennifer Honey & Matilda Wormwood, Lavender (Matilda 1996) & Matilda Wormwood, Matilda Wormwood/Other(s)
Comments: 13
Kudos: 65
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	exactly who we are (is just enough)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Noxnoctisanima](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Noxnoctisanima/gifts).



> merry holidays!! I hope you like it, bb :)
> 
> title from the narnia song by carrie underwood, _there's a place for us_

When it’s time to start thinking about universities, Matilda is both spoilt for choice and— _not_. Of course she has consistently stayed in Crunchem Hall Secondary School’s top ten, her grades near-on perfect and her extracurriculars both varied and thorough.

The problem, of course, lies in the fact that, since Miss Honey had become the primary school’s principal, their little town had experienced a huge shift in how education was handled.

Miss Honey had done evaluations on each and every teacher, had spent an entire summer overhauling the curriculum, taking suggestions from Matilda and her rapidly-growing group of friends. After the primary school was finished, Miss Honey strong-armed the secondary school to follow suit and ever since, their little town churned out an unbelievably high amount of young adults who had a thirst for knowledge and the gpas to match.

Matilda would like to state, for the record, that this is a problem she’s thrilled to have. Her friends love to learn and her mum is the reason why. She’s just aware that oftentimes the Ivy Leagues don’t accept more than one or two students from the same little town.

She sits next to Lavender in chemistry, safety goggles pressing a little too tightly into her forehead, and the two of them mix chemicals and record reactions and argue about what movie they should see over the weekend. Most of the students in class have easily finished cycling through the textbook and tests, and Dr. Ngyuen had proposed a bonus extra project, leaving minimal rules on the chalkboard and letting them run wild, clever, experimentive minds agog with freedom.

They’re all so enthralled with scientific curiosity that they scarcely notice the bell ringing, letting them know that the school day is over. The class is slow to clean up, washing out beakers and making sure all the burners are off, and all of them wave bye to their teacher as they head out, chattering and laughing. Lavender waits for her at the door while Dr. Ngyuen confirms with Matilda that Miss Honey’s cookout is still starting at three the following afternoon.

*

The first summer after university is a whirlwind, and Matilda spends a lot of it using her powers to keep dirt and flies off of the back of her neck as she helps Miss Honey out in the garden, skin turning from pale to red to golden under the sun. In the late afternoons, when it gets just way too hot to do anything, they head down the back path, through the forest behind the property, following the creek to the pond.

They spend long hours swimming and splashing and catching up. Matilda tells her everything she’d managed to forget to mention in phone calls and letter writing and her mum talks at length about lesson plans and her students.

When the sun starts to set and the pink streaks across the sky, they spread out brightly checked blankets along the bank and eat strawberries and watch the stars come out.

In the evening, she meets Lavender for dinner and they see a movie and loiter in the park, slumped on the swings and rocking, just a little, as they talk.

“Tell me more about that girl you keep mentioning,” Lavender ventures when Matilda is finally finished describing in depth the ridiculous pre-finals frat parties that she’d dropped in on.

“Wha—” Matilda starts, defensive and unconvincing. Lavender laughs, but Matilda tries in vain to plow on. “Who—who are you referring to?”

Lavender gives her a knowing look from under her eyelashes, and Matilda laments being best friends with someone she’s known since they were five years old.

She still makes her say it out loud, though.

“I’m _talking_ about Carmen!” Lavender tells her, knowing smile curling at the edges of her mouth and septum piercing glinting when she tosses her head, a little smug.

“She—we’re just _friends_ ,” Matilda protests, halfhearted. When she looks away from the moon, she accidentally catches Lavender’s disbelieving look and the pair of them start giggling like they’re young girls again. Lavender doesn’t push, instead starting to spin a tale about her friend Anya crushing their history T.A. in a discussion about racism in historical documentation.

They spend most of the night there, words drifting out of them slow as molasses, stories from uni slowly unfolding between two lifelong friends as the moon arches across the sky ahead of them.

*

It rains on graduation day, and the ceremony is delayed several hours as aids and volunteers rush to cover everything with thick plastic tarps while they wait the storm out. The later time means that Lavender will be able to see her walk across the stage and not just join them after, for a late dinner at a too-expensive too-crowded restaurant full of other graduates.

It doesn’t mean that they’re free to spend a few extra hours roaming campus or town, though, as Matilda and the rest of the students aren’t permitted to leave the vicinity of the ceremony, though, for fear of ruining their seating orders or further delaying the procession once it finally starts.

Carmen is easy to spot, though, her firetruck red hair tamed into perfect victory curls and the thick angle of her eyeliner making her dark brown eyes more captivating than usual. Matilda slinks and slips through crowds of people, texting her mum and Lavender both, fingers flying across the keypad of her Blackberry like the true business major she is.

As always, Carmen’s theatre friends hiss at her when she joins their brightly-colored little circle, but it’s a well-used joke by now and Matilda just sticks her tongue out at them as she slings an arm over Carmen’s shoulders, hunching in close and pressing three kisses to her temple in greeting, close enough to her hair that she doesn’t say anything about Matilda smudging her makeup.

After the ceremony, Carmen and her parents will be joining Matilda and Lavender and her mum for dinner and it’s the first time the parentals will be meeting. Matilda is only nervous because she knows Carmen’s going home with them for ten days before she will be traveling up to the little village Matilda has lived in her whole life.

The keys to the empty little shop she’d already signed the lease on sit heavy and safe in her napsack pocket and Matilda checks out of the arts’ students conversation again as she debates the setup of her future book store with herself once more.

The summer promises to be busier than most, but she thinks she’s never been so excited.

Carmen’s friend Hime is cut off from his dramatic monologue by the rapid hush that races through the hall when the metal double doors are thrown open. Two advisors stand in the frame, and one of them is announcing that the rain has let up enough to allow for them to start the ceremony _immediately_.

“You ready?” Carmen asks Matilda, grinning so, so wide. Matilda can’t help a smile of her own. She squeezes Carmen’s hand tight for just a moment before nodding and letting it go, so she can go find her own group. Before she can leave, Carmen adjusts her horrible scratchy graduation gown and uses the excuse to kiss her soundly on the mouth, ignoring her friends’ catcalls.

“See you after.” Matilda tells her, and then she goes.

**Author's Note:**

> god you would not believe the trouble I went through to post this tbH


End file.
